1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a microfilm reader/printer and a control method therefor, in which an image recorded on a microfilm is read by an image sensor such as CCD arrayed line sensor and the read image is displayed on a display device as well as output to a printer.
2. Related Art
There is known in the art a microfilm reader/printer, in which an enlarged image of microfilm is projected on a screen for reference. In such a microfilm reader/printer, it is known that the enlarged projection image is read by a line sensor for printing the image.
To read and print out the image photographed on the microfilm at a high density, an enlarged projection image must be read by the line sensor because not enough pixels to print out the microfilm image can be obtained in a conventional, two-dimensional area sensor. A high-density area sensor is too costly to use.
When projecting such an enlarged image on the screen, optical system and light path space need to be reserved and therefore a problem arises in that the apparatus increases in size. To overcome the problem, it may be considered that the image read by the line sensor is displayed on a display such as CRT instead of projecting the image on the screen.
Even in such a case, since the line sensor must be moved in a vertical or subsidiary scanning direction with respect to the static image, it is difficult to read the image at a high speed. In the retrieval of the target frame containing the desired image, the line sensor is also required to perform vertical scanning as the film is moved periodically, therefore, other problems arise in that such a line sensor takes time to retrieve the target frame as well as lowers mechanical durability in moving parts of the line sensor.